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Read Tonight I Said Goodbye (2005)

Tonight I Said Goodbye (2005)

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Genre
Series
Rating
3.8 of 5 Votes: 4
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ISBN
031293209X (ISBN13: 9780312932091)
Language
English
Publisher
st. martin's paperbacks

Tonight I Said Goodbye (2005) - Plot & Excerpts

In this debut mystery novel, former cops Lincoln Perry and Joe Pritchard are private investigators who are propositioned to take on a challenging case. Wayne Weston, also a PI, was recently found dead in his upscale Cleveland home with no sign of a struggle. Additional factors in the case are that his wife Julie and 5-year-old daughter Betsy are missing. Are they dead as well? Did Wayne kill them and then kill himself? Or did someone else kidnap them and kill Wayne? There are many possibilities, and none of them look good. Wayne’s father John is the one propositioning Lincoln to solve the case for him. The local police and FBI are involved, but John is unconvinced that they are getting anywhere with the case. He firmly believes that his son would never hurt his family and would never consider suicide an option. It takes some convincing, but eventually Lincoln Perry reluctantly agrees that he and his partner will take on the case. What follows is lots of twists and unexpected developments filled with nail-biting suspense. Lincoln and Joe discover that a very powerful local businessman, a group of violent Russian mobsters, and a former Marine Corp officer all have ties to the case. Just when they think they have found a solid lead in the case, another murder throws a wrench in the plan. Lincoln goes to South Carolina to follow a lead and runs into someone very unexpected there. Lincoln must figure out how all the different people are involved and get to the bottom of things while there’s still a chance to find Julie and her daughter Betsy and solve Wayne’s death once and for all. Excellent character development and gripping plot twists make this an exciting read. The book is full of good dialog, especially between Lincoln and Joe as they work through possible scenarios and evaluate leads. The reader feels like they are involved and working the case along with the detectives until another twist throws all your ideas out the window. An enjoyable read!

I have read a few reviews here and there on this series and this author. I am glad I followed my instincts and bought this thriller and read it pretty much immediately upon its arrival. I had an agenda as I have been neglecting my thriller and suspense books on Mt Git'r'Read in favor of the cozies, UF, and other mysteries. That's not a bad thing, all the books have been pretty sweeeeet....but my dad is coming out in August and we trade thrillers and suspense between the three of us (Seester, Dad and moi) and I have been lax in the trading on my part. SO...I read this, what turned out to be, superb thriller by this new-to-me author, Michael Koryta. This book had me squinching my toes up and have some wildass dreams (it was my bedside book) of Russians chasing me in the pool and off of balconies. At least, in the dream, I had a bigass gun. Lincoln Perry is a flawed character with an intriguing past of disgrace and looking to redeem himself, sort of. He and his partner, Joe, are good at what they do as private investigators. They are hired by the father of a presumed suicide victim. The father wants to clear his son's name and he thinks his son was murdered instead of having committed suicide. There is more to the case than meets the eye and all hell breaks loose. Anything else will be spoiler city, so I will leave you with this...if you like a tightly honed, superbly written thriller that Lee Child called, "A terrific,first-class debut full of suspense, tension, tricks, and charm." Then this book is for you!Five terrific, first-class beans.....

What do You think about Tonight I Said Goodbye (2005)?

Unfortunately even Scott Brick's excellent narration could not salvage this badly plotted mess. There were so many holes in the plot I gave up trying to solve the mystery and basically spent the second half of the book trying to guess what stupid thing the protagonist would do next.There's a good long list of bad choices and even worse plotting. Here are a few: (view spoiler)[1. Talk about how you don't trust someone but at the same time, let him in on your secret plans.2. Figure out that the FBI guy is dirty, but then use land lines to have important conversations. (For some reason, this one never came back to bite them.)3. While hiding from the bad guys, leave a kid unattended in a hotel room to go down for a bit of fun in the hot tub.4. Play hide and go seek with a kid when you know bad guys are looking for her.5. Continue to use a rental car that police are looking for in at least two states.6. Be on the run and in hiding, yet don't have your bags packed and ready to go.7. Forget the most important piece of evidence there is and have to go back for it.8. Try to throw off your pursuers by driving to another city, but then take the most direct route there is back to where the bad guys are expecting you. Never could figure that one out! (hide spoiler)]
—Pamela

Investigator Wayne Weston is found dead, an apparent suicide. His wife and six-year-old daughter are missing and officials believe that it is a murder-suicide. Wayne's father, a crusty WWII vet, hires Lincoln Perry and his partner, Joe Pritchard, to investigate.With excellent dialogue and interesting characters, Michael Koryta takes the reader on the trail as the detectives accept the case and look into the details. The investigators are surprised at the start. It seems that Weston doesn't have any current cases. He does seem to be doing some work for wealthy Jeremiah Hubbard, a real estate developer who is attempting to purchase waterfront property in Cleveland and create a riverfront that will be even better than New Orleans'. When Perry and his partner visit with Hubbard, Hubbard won't admit anything and then attempts to bribe them to drop the case.This makes the investigators more suspecious and intent to find out what was going on. The search has some unsuspected turns when they find a connection to a group of Russians who are underworld figures.This is Michael Koryta's first novel and a well done job. He uses dialogue to get to know the characters and the reader becomes almost an interested participant as the case develops. Koryta gives the readeer a number of surprises and keeps the action going throughout the story.
—Michael

Tonight I Said Goodbye is a very well written entry into the detective / mystery genre. The fact that the narration was by Scott Brick is an added bonus which adds up to a 5+ star recommendation. I will say if I had read it rather than listened to it, I still would have awarded 5 stars but I wouldn't have read to it in my car, done an extra hour of yard work so I could keep listening or sat in my driveway to finish it off yesterday after a long day in the car. I was disappointed when my audio club sent me all of Michael Koryta's books from my list at once but that was before I listened to this. Now I am thrilled I have some more to listen to. The characters are well drawn and the mystery has enough twists to keep you guessing and then some. Please note the twists are honest and well thought out, in keeping with the narrative flow. (As opposed to the dishonest twists which some authors throw in. You know what I mean; in Chapter one the author has the character speed by a gas station with an A in its names and in the last chapter the character realizes the A meant there was an abduction afoot.) You won't find anything dishonest in this or anything less than entertaining.
—Nadeen

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